13 Different Muscle Cars Of SEMA- The Cars Of Sema

1/40You might recognize Kenny Wayne Shepherd's '72 Charger from an episode of Hot Rod television that aired last year. Here it is all finished, showing off in the Mopar Performance booth at SEMA.

The Specialty Equipment Market Association, more commonly known to automotive enthusiasts as SEMA, is an organization that brings the manufacturers, wholesalers, and retailers of the performance aftermarket community together. Their annual trade-only convention is held annually at the Las Vegas Convention Center in early November, and member manufacturers show their newest and greatest parts to the eager members of the media, as well as potential buyers.

As a way for these manufacturers to display their products at work, it isn't uncommon for them to place a couple of choice vehicles in their booth. Being the biggest aftermarket parts convention in the country, there is pressure to show the best of the best. Our job here is to pick from those, the most impressive, unique, and interesting cars. It's a difficult task, and a lot of nice cars were omitted due to space, but we're giving it our best shot here.

General Motors built this development/prototype car to be run in the Grand Am racing series. The GS (Grand Sport) class is highly controlled, as many classes are. There are negotiations to compensate for higher horsepower, resulting in a higher weight minimum, or lower rpm maximum. These factors are equalized to generate the same lap times out of every car, to make the race more about the driver's skill and the car's durability. While the GS Camaro program manager, Dwight Woodbridge, would have loved to go wild on the build, he stuck closely to the class's rules. The power comes from a factory LS3, at just over 400 horsepower. This is backed by a Tremec 6060 six-speed manual transmission. What's nice about the 400-horsepower rule is that a stock clutch works just fine.

This being the first car built for this purpose, the development phase would take a lot of attention. Countless hours of track testing and tuning resulted in a finely tuned race car for the 2009 Grand Am series. Since all the kinks have been worked out, they can source the production version to an outside builder. The design of the race car and the version available to the public will be nearly identical. These turnkey race cars will have a starting price of $130,000. The builder General Motors picked to craft each subsequent car is Riley Technologies. They work exclusively on race cars and have the manpower to fill the orders for this ready-to-run race car.

BY THE NUMBERS

GENERAL MOTORS

2010 CHEVY CAMARO

Owner:

General Motors

Hometown:

Detroit, MI

Engine size & type:

6.2-liter GM LS3

Transmission:

Tremec 6060 6-speed manual

Performance:

430 horsepower

Front suspension:

modified factory struts, camber/caster plates with solid bushings

Rear suspension:

short/long arm style independent with solid bushings

Brakes:

Brembo 4-piston calipers front, factory disc rear

Wheels & tires:

Fikse wheels, Hoosier spec racing tires

Paint & body:

PPG Midnight Blue painted by General Motors

Built by:

General Motors

Vendor affiliation:

General Motors

Years owned:

1

John Levitz is the owner of AirAid, but that position didn't get him this car. He was only a junior in high school when he attended his first car auction. There he picked up this 1966 Shelby Mustang that had been freshly restored. This car got him through high school and college, easily being one of the coolest student cars around. The Mustang came with some history; it had been featured in magazines in the first chapter of its life. With over 30,000 miles of wear put on during school, the Mustang was due for a second restoration, which would award it more space on the glossy inner pages of more magazines. The car didn't need an extreme makeover to make it special or to make it perform. From the factory, the car received many upgrades, including traction bars, disc brakes, and an extremely reliable transmission. The only major upgrade John did was to replace the tired original motor with a Ford Motorsports 487-horsepower 353-inch small-block of their IR-series engines.

Since the Shelby's restoration (which shared garage space with our very own '75 Laguna on the cover), it doesn't see commuter traffic, or late-night runs to the grocery store, but it still gets shown off to his peers. He attends the local "Cars and Coffee" get-together where car enthusiasts gather early on the weekends for a light breakfast and tons of car talk. Having his own booth at SEMA for AirAid made his car stand out in the group. When you've had a car for over 30 years like John has, it becomes more like showing off your child than your vehicle.

Jesse Greening of Cullman, Alabama, founded Greening Auto Company to facilitate his love for car building and turn it into a living. Though the shop's focus was mostly on the earlier cars of the 1930s and '40s, he craved building something a little more muscular. He felt the market had been saturated with first-generation Camaros; so many had been built to where it takes extreme measures to make the cars really stand out. Jesse's style was more along the simple and powerful lines. Long ago, he saw the potential of second-generation Camaros, and finally had his chance to build one. He started off with a relatively straightforward build. The clean 1971 RS got a coat of BASF's Glasurit Lamp Black paint applied by his father, Jeff, who was a huge helping hand in the build.

The custom work in the engine bay was the most notable part of the car. It housed an LS1 with custom-painted valve covers and a dual-tube intake. Jesse and his dad stretched the inner fenders toward the motor to conceal the business of the suspension. The look they were after was clean, and they got it. The interior followed the same vibe as the engine bay, taking advantage of the smooth lines of the late model.

Aside from Jesse being able to say he has had the car at SEMA, he will be showing it off at the local car shows. He looks forward to working it around the Goodguys autocross course thanks to his totally upgraded suspension and brakes. He's been working with Baer brakes for a long time, and was happy to loan them the car for SEMA.

Some of us know what we want to do when we grow up at an early age, and Justin Meyers of Oswego, Illinois, was one of those kids. He dreamed of owning his own shop where he would build the cars he loved. Justin graduated high school with a degree in mechanical engineering, giving him an edge over the competition. He could now integrate what he learned in school to build some really spectacular cars. That left him one problem: finances. That's when he teamed up with Ryan Diem of the Indianapolis Colts. With a slightly higher discretionary budget, Ryan invested in Justin's shop. As a team, they built the shop, Modern Muscle, into what it is today. We asked Justin what his specialty was, but the answer of anything custom seemed pretty vague. He has been focusing on the Pro Touring style incorporated into our favorite muscle cars. After doing a little digging, we found he is also on the late-model front, developing aftermarket parts for Mopar's LX platform, which covers Chargers, Magnums, 300s, and Challengers. With the Challenger new on the market, Justin will be ready when more people are looking to improve them.

With an in-house chassis dyno, Modern Muscle can really crank the muscle out of these cars. Like many builders, Justin has fallen in love with the LS engines, and has been setting cars up on the dyno with much success. Next on the to-do list is a '67 Camaro, which we think will top this Chevelle's 1,000-horsepower benchmark.

Los Angeles is a place filled with movie stars and deep car culture. Normally, these two things don't mix, but for builder Dennis McCarthy, they do. Dennis is the build coordinator for Universal Studios. He is responsible for the cars of the The Fast and the Furious movies, Death Race, The Kingdom, and Redline. He asked us to please mention that he was responsible for the quality of the cars, not the movies themselves. His job is to coordinate a group of builders, a place to work, and all the equipment to crank out up to 120 cars in a six-month timeframe for filming. One of his creations was this 1970 Charger, built for the to-be-released The Fast and the Furious 4. Before this job, he was building cars at his own shop in Burbank, California. He had been asked to work on a couple of cars for commercials, started hanging out on set in case they needed him, and then he got the offer to build for production companies full time.

The more important cars in the movies, the Mopars, all get completely stripped and cleaned before bodywork and fabrication begins. We know Mopar guys are going to hate this, but all of these cars get a small-block Chevy, Turbo 400 automatic transmission, and a Ford 9-inch rear end. The Mopar stuff gets too expensive and hard to find for something that needs to be ready for action at a moment's notice.

Of course, Dennis couldn't build this many cars by himself; he employs up to 40 people at a time to help with the workload. So if you love building cars, and love car movies even more, then working on these feature film cars is the job for you!

You may remember builder Doug Shultz of Maple Valley, Washington, for receiving the 2001 Goodguys Street Machine of the Year award for his '67 Nova. The Nova graced the pages of many magazines, including the cover of PHR, shortly after the award was given. Back then, the Street Machine of the Year contenders were a soup of Chevys, and Doug wanted to introduce something different to the mix.

As many projects start, Doug was looking to give it some cool wheels and a slick paintjob. After scoring some monster meats for the rear, he saw he needed to tub the rear. The tub would then require relocation of the framerails, and a complete back half suspension. Once the back was done, the front needed some work to match, and the snowball got bigger. He started to build this 1966 Ford Fairlane in hopes to compete for the 2003 award, but because of life's trials, he sold his shop and the car didn't enter the competition until 2007. One vote short, Doug didn't make it to the Top 5. This by no means discouraged him from continuing to show the car and have fun with it. He frequents Goodguys car shows and heaves this midsize through the autocross course as if he won the award.

While many builders try to get every new shiny part on their car, Doug found what he started with in 2002 to work just great. The seven-year-old, two-piston Baer brakes still clamp tight around the rotors to ensure survival through the turns. We may not see another Street Machine of the Year award with Doug's name on it, but he's got plans to build an electric car with all the car show's classic features.

It's hard to imagine the pain of starting a website dedicated to the type of car you've only dreamed of owning. Larry Callahan of Thousand Oaks, California, did just that. Eight years ago (it seems like yesterday to Larry), he started Pro-Touring.com. It's a place for people with Pro Touring style cars, or people who just like them, to come together and discuss everything about these cars. The extreme amount of feedback and participation made expanding the website a natural. Larry organized events where people on the website could meet and play with their cars. All this time, he didn't have a supercar himself. He had a `68 Camaro that he drove daily once upon a time, and he'd been saving to realize his dream for a while, when the opportunity to display at the SEMA show in Centerforce's booth came along.

The Pro Touring theme is defined as modern upgrades to an older car that make it handle better. To perform the overhaul, Larry employed Prodigy Customs, where Frank Sarafine took over. The build needed to be completed in 42 days to be ready in time for SEMA, so it was the center of focus for an intense six weeks.

Every muscle car needs a lot of horsepower, and Prodigy delivered. They built a 406-inch small-block Chevy starting with a Dart Little M block, and planted two Precision turbos atop to produce what the calculator says is around 800 horsepower on pump gas. Pro Touring cars need to not just go fast in a straight line, but turn and stop, too. With a full set of tubular control arms from Art Morrison, Air Ride ShockWaves, and lightweight wheels and brakes from Forgeline and Wilwood, the Camaro would easily fall into the genre he loves so much.

BY THE NUMBERS

CENTERFORCE

1968 CHEVY CAMARO

Owner:

Larry Callahan, 42

Occupation:

Aerospace machine shop manager, owner Pro-Touring.com

Hometown:

Thousand Oaks, CA

Engine size & type:

twin-turbo 406-inch small-block Chevy

Transmission:

Richmond 6-speed manual

Performance:

est. 800 horsepower

Front suspension:

Art Morrison subframe, Air Ride Shockwaves

Rear suspension:

Prodigy four-link, Air Ride ShockWaves, Moser rear end

Brakes:

Wilwood 14-inch rotors, 6- and 4-piston calipers

Wheels & tires:

Forgeline SO3P wheels, BFGoodrich KDW 275/35R18 and 335/30R18

Paint & body:

BASF Glasurit Steel Silver custom blend

Built by:

Prodigy Customs, Apopica, FL

Vendor affiliation:

Centerforce

Years owned:

25, built in 42 days

This car wasn't just built for show, it was designed and modified to participate in the Targa Newfoundland Rally. Every September for the last seven years, this organization leads a couple dozen cars over 1,200 miles through the sweeping vistas and rugged coast lines of eastern and southern Newfoundland. The weather can be harsh at times, and the pace too fast and focused to be able to absorb the views surrounding the driver. This is OK for the guys, who aren't looking to go sight seeing, but looking to flaunt their car around every kind of road condition possible.

Mopar wanted in on this fun. The stocker Challenger, like nearly all production cars, would not be equipped to handle this. The Mopar team dropped in their 392-inch late-model Hemi crate motor to give it the necessary juice to drive up the mountains. Eric Vickerman, Performance Parts Engineer over at Mopar, tells us from experience: "Power is key to the competition." Their first time out to this event, with the Challenger virgin to the mountains of Canada, they took home a Second place trophy in their class. He attributes this success to the changes made in Detroit. Aside from the high-horsepower crate motor, the Challenger used a full racing-style coilover setup designed by KW and Mopar's race team. The nice thing about the Challenger is that it comes from the factory with a flat floor. Once you remove the carpet, however, you are left with an un-even, uncomfortable floor, so a second faux floor was installed to smooth it out.

You can't get this particular color on this car, but Super Sublime Green is a Mopar factory color. You may have seen it on a Viper or two--we hope it becomes a production Challenger paint option.

BY THE NUMBERS

MOPAR PERFORMANCE

2009 DODGE CHALLENGER

Owner:

Mopar

Hometown:

Detroit, MI

Engine size & type:

392-inch Hemi crate motor

Transmission:

Tremec TR6060 6-speed manual

Performance:

540 horsepower

Front suspension:

factory single wishbone with Mopar coilovers

Rear suspension:

factory w/Mopar coilovers

Brakes:

StopTech 15- and 14-inch rotors

Wheels & tires:

SM Wheel Dyno 55, Pirelli PZero 285/35R20 tires

Paint & body:

Super Sublime Green

Built by:

Mopar

Vendor affiliation:

Mopar

Years owned:

1

The inspiration for this car comes from owner Ben Grasso's long lost '69 Road Runner he had as a high school student. He had bought a black-on-black '69 Road Runner with the factory 383 and an automatic when he was 15 years old to have ready to drive by 16. He finally had the opportunity to pay tribute to those times and build a car how he would've back then if he could've. Back then, his resources were low, forcing him to use cheap filler and even cheaper paint to smooth up the exterior. Now he can use the best of the best and give it the smooth-as-glass black paint he always wanted. The car was going to be for himself or for the shop to use as their show car, but that changed when he got a call from Mr. Dawson Davenport of Buckeye, Arizona. Dawson saw our PHR feature on Ben's Super Bee, and was sure he wanted something built by Plum Floored Creations. Lucky for him, there was one already half built. Very few changes were made to the build after Dawson was onboard. The horsepower requirement went from 700 to 1,000, as the desire for power inflated. They achieved this number with 22 psi of boost from a Vortech supercharger, on a built 426-inch Hemi.

BY THE NUMBERS

LEGENDARY AUTO INTERIORS

1969 PLYMOUTH ROAD RUNNER

Owner:

Dawson Davenport, 30

Occupation:

car builder

Hometown:

Buckeye, AZ

Engine size & type:

426-inch stoker late-model Hemi

Transmission:

{{{Chrysler}}} NAG-1 5-speed automatic

Performance:

est. 950 horsepower

Front suspension:

RMS AlterKtion torsion bar system

Rear suspension:

SRT-8

Brakes:

Wilwood 14- and 13-inch rotors, 6- and 4-piston calipers

Wheels & tires:

DPE 18- and 20-inch wheels, Yokohama S-Drive tires

Paint & body:

Sherwin-William's Planet Color Obsidian Black

Built by:

Plum Floored Creations, Phoenix, AZ

Vendor affiliation:

Legendary Auto Interiors

Years owned:

1

Daren Metropoulos is probably the world's youngest billionaire. He has a collection of pristine, unmodified, and unrestored classics, including some Boss Mustangs, split-window Corvettes, and other irreplaceable cars. Nevertheless, the poor guy wanted something a bit different to add to his collection. When someone with nearly endless funds wants the best custom car money can buy, he goes to Chip Foose. Daren brought Chip the perfect candidate for the restoration--an absolutely unmolested California-born 1970 'Cuda. Only a touch of surface rust lived under the vinyl top, but nothing that couldn't be taken care of by a 3M pad.

At SEMA, this '70 'Cuda was constantly swarmed by admirers. At every square inch, there was something special on this car. One of the major changes Mr. Foose performed was relocating the front wheels. The factory set the front wheels in an awkward position, making the nose of the car look unsupported. When you are the frame's designer, however, you can change whatever you want. Chip worked with Art Morrison to build a frame that set the wheels within the factory fender as he wished. The objective was to make it look how it should have from the factory.

To give an example of exactly how much attention to detail this car got, look at the bumpers. Together they received over 400 hours of work to get them where they are. They were sectioned and fitted against the body panels for a consistently small gap. Once they were fit, each bumper got between 12 and 16 coats of copper before being chromed. Between each coat, they leveled them with a sanding block to ensure a perfectly flat mirror-sharp finish.

The folks at Foose Designs really wanted to hang onto this car to parade around to shows, but its eager owner wants to take it home and rip it around the neighborhood.

Sally Cox of Anaheim, CA, has been dreaming of this car for years. Her husband, Greg, owns a custom plating business in Signal Hill, California, where he's been working with cars for years. Greg has a collection of cars himself, but wanted to build Sally a car of her own. Sally had her heart set on a fastback, but they are becoming harder and harder to come by, so she settled for this '67 coupe.

The inspiration came from the Shelby car that was never put into production. There was only one '67 Coupe with Shelby's name on it that acted as a prototype. This car's name was Li'l Red, coded EXP500. The car was scrapped soon after its creation, and Sally thought that was a shame. She and her husband built her Mustang as the '67 Shelby coupe that never was. They followed the Shelby style, but added their own personal touches. This Mustang, originally a six-cylinder car, received a 427 FE motor to be a little bit different. She wanted the look of the car to be as clean as possible. The engine bay is simply immaculate, with the entire engine painted a deep blue to keep you ignorant to the near 800 horsepower that lives within. They made sure to hide as much wiring as possible and keep the interior simple. The traditional four-speed shifter pokes through a factory console, but don't be fooled. The Toploader transmission wears a Gear Vendors unit on its tail, making it an overdrive and underdrive transmission.

Lucky enough to be based in Southern California, they brought the car to Chip Foose for paint and wheel design. It now wears one-off Foose Design wheels that were kept a secret to even the owner until just before the SEMA show in Las Vegas.

The purpose of building this car was to give NHRA class racers a completely legal drag car good for 10s. For now, production is limited to 50 units, but we're sure there will be more like it in the future. Ford really wanted to get the Mustang back into Sportsman racing, and it was sure nice to get a 9-inch in a Ford again!

This is a drag car built with a discriminating eyes toward the NHRA rulebook to ensure the legality, and safety was of top concern. The team at Ford is currently waiting approval on the horsepower rating to fit the rulebook, but we're looking at around 425 horsepower backed with an automatic or manual transmission.

The suspension has been modified to give the car optimum traction and weight transfer. The front sway bar was removed for weight savings and to loosen the front end. There is a crossbar unnecessary for racing in the front that was removed for weight reduction. The rear suspension got a 9-inch Ford housing suspended by components built by Team Z Racing. The brakes on a drag car are aimed more at weight savings than clamping power, since it only needs to slow the car once per heat cycle. That's why they made sure the Ford Racing exclusive Bogart wheels slip right over the factory brakes. At 15 inches in diameter, larger aftermarket brakes aren't an option.

One of three test mules (above the 50 production cars) will be auctioned off at Barrett-Jackson. The auction car was driven by many famous drivers, including John Force, Mike Neff (NHRA rookie of the year), Gas Rhonda (original Cobra Jet NHRA champion racer), Bob Glidden (winningest NHRA Pro Stock driver), and Bill Glidden (winningest Outlaw 10.5-inch tire racer). Proceeds will go toward introducing new NHRA Sportsman programs for the 2009 season.

BY THE NUMBERS

FORD MOTOR CO.

2008 FORD MUSTANG

Owner:

Ford Racing

Hometown:

Detroit, MI

Engine size & type:

5.4-liter supercharged 4-valve, aluminum

Transmission:

modified T-56 6-speed manual

Performance:

top secret!

Front suspension:

factory Ford, removed sway bar and crossbeam

Rear suspension:

Team Z parts, 9-inch Ford housing

Brakes:

factory Ford

Wheels & tires:

Cobra Jet

Paint & body:

Cobra Jet graphics

Built by:

Ford Racing

Vendor affiliation:

Ford

Years owned:

1

After watching an episode of Rides on TLC featuring Pure Vision's 1970 Road Runner project, car enthusiast Robert Solorzano fell in love. This inspiration justified a trip from his hometown of San Francisco, California, to Pure Vision's headquarters in Simi Valley. He put down a deposit to get in line, though the waiting list was over three years long. Robert had an idea of what he wanted them to build, but was open to changes. One day, Steve Strope, owner and founder of Pure Vision, had a vision. What if the car was built as if it lived in Europe? As if the high-end engineering and style were incorporated into the cars as they were in Ferraris? Robert was more than excited about this new theme, so the research began.

Steve wanted the car to look as authentic as possible, and part of that was making it right-hand drive. The tubular control arm conversion by AlterKation replaces the torsion-bar-style suspension with dual A-arms and gives the option of rack-and-pinion steering. Of course, the rack would have to be reversed to accommodate the column on the other side. Flaming River filled the order of the column and was able to incorporate their newest product, an electric power steering unit, where the resistance is adjustable. Some models even adjust themselves as downforce increases.

On every surface and in every corner is a touch of Euro, from the Lola race car-inspired Bonspeed wheels, to the Ferrari-like intake manifold. Throughout the car, steel was replaced with aluminum to keep with the high efficiency of the exotic supercars for a weight savings of approximately 500 pounds.